AllFreeNovel
Share Us
As the knowledge sinks in, Brandee’s face shuts down, her bright blue eyes losing most of the sharpness to them.
“Tell your daddy that my daddy still wants to buy the ranch.”
“Will do.”
Brandee aims her narrowed-eyed stare at me. “Did he tell you that we had a baby?”
And just like that my stupid, klutzy heart turns to stone and crumbles under the weight of disappointment I feel.
“Damn it!” Dane’s booming voice makes me jerk, the silverware crashing back down on the table he slammed with a flat palm.
“We did. We had a baby and he made me get rid of it,” she hurries to inform me.
I’m going to be sick. I’m about to throw up the filet with sherry mushroom sauce I ate minutes ago. “Excuse me.” I quickly slide out of the booth and run to the ladies room with my hand over my mouth.
“Stella!”
In a state of panic, I blast open the doors and make it to the toilet in the nick of time, the food coming up a lot faster than it went down.
The door bangs open for a second time and heavy male footsteps enter. “Stella?”
“You can’t be in here,” I hear the middle-aged woman standing at the sink tell him, the first woman in the history of mankind that doesn’t immediately fall into a lust trance by the sight of the Great Dane Wylder.
“Stella.” His voice is soft and sweet. His big hand gently falls on my back and rubs up and down my spine. He grabs my hair and holds it away from my face as I heave up more food. “Let me get you a paper towel.”
A beat later he’s pressing one into my hand. I wipe my mouth and start to cry. And not small, delicate tears. Nope. I’m talking no-holds-barred crying. Ugly crying. Crying like someone ripped my heart out. Crying like someone told me my return on investments was only two percent for the year.
This is everything I fear. I can’t be my mother, longing for a man that was never mine in the first place, continuously reminded of the women he had and the women he may want in the future. I can’t live like that.
Dane bundles me in his arms and holds on tight, whispering platitudes, words I can’t make out, kisses the top of my head, the shell of my ear, my tear-soaked cheek.
I should stop him, push him away, but I can’t manage it. Boneless in his arms and exhausted beyond measure, I lean in and let him hold me.
“Let’s go home.”
“Wait,” I croak.
I tear myself away and make it to the sink, splash water on my face, rinse out my mouth. Hot mess doesn’t even begin to describe me.
In the mirror our eyes lock and it’s all there, a myriad of emotions displayed openly on his face. Guilt, concern, and discomfort are only a few.
“I’m fine,” I tell him. I’m ready to repeat it a thousand times if that’s what it will take to wipe away the concern.
Ignoring me, he hooks an arm under my knees and picks me up with no effort whatsoever. My arms automatically wrap around his neck.
“I can walk, Dane.”
In a rush to leave, Dane doesn’t spare anyone a glance. In contrast, we immediately become the object of everyone’s interest.
Leaning against the bar, Brandee’s talking to another woman. Their speculative glances track us across the room. Without a doubt, they’re talking about me, about what a first-class sucker I am.
“What about Nyla? We didn’t say goodbye.”
Dane’s grip on me tightens. “I’ll call later.” As he carries me past the bar, Noah spots us and frowns. “Tell Nyla we had to leave.”
Noah replies with a curt nod, his hawkish eyes narrowing in concern.
Outside the clean air settles my stomach, the nausea somewhat dissipating. I’m placed on my feet while he unlocks the truck, after which he puts me in. Stepping between my legs, his big hands cradling my face, he forces me to meet his examining gaze.
“She’s lying.”
“I don’t care,” I snap back, head shaking.
“She is, she’s lying and I’ll explain everything when we get home.”
“I don’t care, Dane! Your personal life is none of my business.”
“Bullshit.”
His long lashes lower. In his gold flecked eyes, I see burning need and desire. I don’t doubt that he wants me. The question is, for how long? His focus darts between my eyes and my lips. And then he does it, he lowers his lips onto mine and softly, gently, tentatively kisses me.
I push him off and he lifts his head, eyelids heavy, gaze drowsy.
“I just threw up.”
He smiles then, one of his crooked smiles, and it melts my lonely heart. “Stella,” he murmurs as if it’s a term of endearment, his favorite word in the English language––or any other language for that matter.
His head slowly dips again, and keeps lowering until his mouth meets mine. This is nothing like the kiss in the kitchen. That was a mauling. A punishment. This one is tender and honest, unsullied by other motives.
This is a kiss for the sake of a kiss.
It feels as if everything has been leading up to this moment, this terrifying, beautiful, imperfect moment. And as my eyes shut, something magical happens––
When I was nine I saw Sleeping Beauty for the first time and I was not impressed. Why would Sleeping Beauty want to be kissed? I didn’t understand it. I thought it was yucky. I remember asking my mother about it.
“Because with the right man,” she explained. “You’ll feel so happy you could fly, and when you close your eyes you’ll be flying among the stars.”
She said all this in Spanish of course. Years later, at the advanced age of fifteen, I had my first kiss with Joey Finnegan in a risqué game of truth or dare. All I felt was a slimy, wet slide, and all I saw were the whitehead pimples near his nose.
But now…now all I see are stars. An explosion of stars. A supernova’s got nothing on Dane Wylder’s kiss.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Stella
The ride home was quiet. Nervous anticipation, lust––you name it, it was all there, crowding the space between us. Neither one of us said or did anything to acknowledge it.
As soon as the truck stopped, I jumped out and darted into the house, shouting over my shoulder about having to use the bathroom.
I’m a real cool customer as you can tell––but I needed to regroup. I needed to get away from the sphere of powerful pheromones he was emitting and clear my head. Because all the months of foreplay boil down to this––once that line is crossed, there is no turning back. This friendship, unorthodox as it may be, will be irrevocably changed.
In the bathroom I wash my face, my teeth, brush my hair. I inspect myself in the mirror. Anything to drag it out as long as possible. Sex isn’t a big deal to me. Sex with Dane, however, is the biggest deal of all. And sex is what we’re circling around. Nothing more. At least, for him it isn’t.
When I step into the bedroom, he’s sitting at the end of the bed. Shoes off, like me, still dressed, like me. His elbows rest on his knees, his hands are tucked under his chin. He looks as conflicted as I feel. I’m not overreacting; this is big for both of us.
He glan
ces up with a gaze so intense I’m surprised it doesn’t burn the clothes off my body. He holds out a hand and in two steps I’m there, mine sliding into his––as natural as breathing. He pulls me onto his lap, his thick muscular thighs contracting at the feel of my soft ones, and wraps his arms around my waist, careful not to press on my tummy.
The nerves dissolve into desire, the little voice in my head––the one that loves to scream out four-alarm fires––strangely quiet for once.
His long lashes lower, throwing shade on those movie star cheekbones, the ones I know he inherited from his mother.
“Remember when I told you that I always wear protection?”
Dread falls heavy. It’s immediate. One minute all is good, the next I’m bracing for the worst. I’m really not up for hearing about his sexual history with Brandee with the perfect hair and the two ees.
“Umm, yeah.”
“I came home for Christmas my sophomore year. I didn’t always, but that year I did…Noah and I were partyin’––we were both wasted.” He grimaces.
“I think I know the punchline.” When I try to push off his lap, his grip tightens, gently but firmly keeping me in place.
“Hear me out,” he pleads. Looking into his handsome face, I nod for him to continue. “We had sex and I did get her pregnant. That’s the reason I’ve been so strict about it since.”
My eyes cut to the ceiling as I lie back on the bed. Following, he gets up on an elbow and hovers over me. “She assumed I’d marry her.”
His face grows dark and the hand gripping my hip tightens.
“You don’t owe me an explanation.”
“Yes, I do,” he insists. “When I made it very clear I had no intention of doin’ that––that if it turned out to be mine, I would take care of my kid, nothin’ else––she got rid of it without tellin’ me. She said she wasn’t sure it was mine.”
There’s no guessing how he feels about it. When his downcast eyes rise, they’re clouded with pain.
“I’m sorry.”
“She didn’t need the money. Her daddy’s got more than she could ever spend. She wanted a husband, one that was set to become famous, and I was a prime target…and when she didn’t get what she wanted, my child was expendable.”
